I would still be surprised. But analyzing these sorts of situations in the first place is already going to be sketchy and non-specific. It's hard to interpret the meaning of lines like this.

My bottom line: It seems extremely unrealistic that you would have an opponent aggressive enough on the turn that K-high is a +EV call on the turn, but a pair of kings is a fold on the river. I'm not going to say it's impossible, because you can always crank up villain's turn betting range to be all hands and reduce villain's river betting to just the nuts. That would maximize the number of hands to call with on the turn and make the river a straight fold-to-any-bet.

Up to this point, no affirmative argument has been made that one should *expect* that there are hands that call on the turn and fold on ALL rivers. It seems that if you can't call on the river even if the best card fell, then there's not much value in calling on the turn. It seems like a hyper-exploitative move that could only work if your opponent is really awful and unbalanced in their strategy.

Take the hand from the op, make the river an Ace and change it to no limit just for the river. Big blind bets 4x pot. I think that's a clear fold.

I think that change would also call a lot of the previous decisions into question*. You're trying to go from an extremely underbet pot preflop, flop, and turn, and then suddenly a massive overbet on the river but you can't call with top pair? The whole line seems unrealistic, and you would have to do a much more thorough analysis before I would believe that the hand was played correctly leading up to that point. (What happened to assuming that your opponent was good?)

Also, by changing the underlying betting structure, you're wandering quite far from where you started. It's starting to feel like you're trying to force your conclusion without understanding all the implications of the changes you're making. The rules of what governs good/bad play will be applied completely differently with the structure.

Edit: * Min-raise preflop. 1/4 pot bet on the flop, min-check-raise, call. 1/4 pot bet on the turn. 4x bet on the river. I'm sure at least one of those is a bad play before the river. There's not a lot of logic to the hand.

I thought that was the whole point of conversing. To explore the possibilities.

I'm just talking poker. Nothing to prove.

The stipulation I presented was that only the river was no limit betting.

Ummmmm... perhaps to explore the possibilities within the confines of known and better understood poker variants? As soon as you start speculating on games that have structures totally unlike anything that has been studied or experienced, what meaningful conclusions can you draw? What are you actually saying that has merit or use or value?

I don't read your responses in that manner. Why would you invent a strange variant you know nothing about that happens to fit the characteristic you're trying to say is somehow important/meaningful/accurate and then insist on the rightness of your conclusion (without a single word of analysis or evaluation) other than to try to prove that it can be done?

Sloppy wording on my part. I'm trying to say that under any "normal" types of analyses, you would conclude something has already gone wrong. So in the game you know nothing about, on what basis are you concluding anything meaningful about the line taken and how to best assess the hand ranges?

Edit: I'll quote myself --

The game you described does not reflect the reality of poker. Maybe such a game will exist in the future, but there is no precedent for this game in the past or present history of poker, and your speculations on some other game that is as far removed from reality in its betting structures as limit up to 4th street and a no limit river is not a meaningful addition to the conversation.

Look, I do this in my spare time for fun. If you don't like talking about abstract stuff then maybe you should ignore me. Because I do like talking about the abstract.

Right. If the turn bet was all in then calling down with the A7o would be more profitable, or less unprofitable, than it would be if there was another call to make on the river.

The first part was an honest question that was correctly answered by Aaron. It's not my conclusion by any means, but I see how it could be interpreted that way.

The second part was speculation that I threw out there.

I had no motivations for posting these bits that Aaron claims that I'm insisting are correct other than a desire to chat about poker.

For fun.

I don't have any problems with the abstract as long as there is accompanying argumentation and rationale being presented. If you're just going to make up something on the fly and insist over multiple posts that you have things right, it just doesn't come off as exploration and abstraction. Nor does it sound like you're trying to have a conversation.

You also went from:

to adding this addendum:

then to

It's really hard to follow what you're actually trying to say because it almost seems that you've gone back on your addendum. That adds to the feeling that you're trying to prove a point.

For something you've been thinking about for 18 months, your ideas are very disjointed. You're not on the topic of the OP, nor are you on the topic of the main theme you were trying to hit. And at this point, I can't tell what poker you're actually trying to discuss.

I posted specifically because I don't have the answers. I'm not trying to prove anything to anyone. I have no agenda besides learning about poker for fun.

This back and forth isn't helping me learn anything though, nor is it fun. I'm just putting out some ideas and asking some questions. Sometimes I'm wrong, and I'm fine with that.

What the ****? I did no such thing. It's this kind of bull**** that just pisses me off. I make speculative statements, yes. When someone shows me that I'm wrong, I try to change the statement in the hopes that it's correct. I consistently preface these statements with "I think..." or "Maybe.." or "It seems.." in the hopes that readers don't take it as gospel, which you seem to do on a consistent basis.

Completely ****show thread once again. You guys have one guess on what commonality is the best predictor of when a thread will devolve into complete nonsense.

Bonus points if you successfully eliminate that determining factor in future threads.

Then we use language very differently:

This language feels like you have a specific point you're trying to make. There's a thing that you think is true that you think other people have wrong. The surrounding language sounds like you're trying to justify this "theme."

If this isn't a "theme" that you're trying to tackle, and this isn't a point you're trying to make, then I apologize for misunderstanding you.

I think the statements contained in that are true but in boring ways. I felt the phrasing you used was unhelpful because it gave away the whole game by defining the cards to already be below average outcomes for you. So there's not much happening.

You modified your statement at that point. And I've been trying to elaborate on the new point by providing specific examples, such as the K-high turning into a pair of kings on the river situation. I've attempted to show you that I think it's unrealistic that reasonable hand ranges play out in a way that calling to check-fold every single river even if the best card hits is actually a thing that happens.

You disagree. You think that in this limit/no-limit hybrid game you just made up, that somehow calling ace-high on the turn and folding a pair of aces on the river is right.

Why do you think this? Why not say a few words about what you think is happening with the hand ranges? So you think it's a "clear fold"? Maybe you should explore why you think it's a clear fold. Maybe you think that because it's a big bet that you can't call without at least two pair? Maybe you can put some hand ranges or something out there to support your position? That's where "learning" is going to come from.

What would it take to "help you learn" something? I've stated my position clearly. I've provided explanations for why I think what I do. Why don't you try doing the same?

Imo If that was true, you should of simply fold the turn right away ...

You have 22 on a AAA X board and an A hit river would make me fold the river !

“You disagree”

Not exactly. I was looking to find the extent to which the statement applied.

Right. Unless villain's river check through rate is absurdly high, it's hard to see where you get value on the turn by calling if you can't ever call a river bet.

LOL -- You might have me on that one. In a very real way, you've "improved." Maybe call to chop if X = K saves my position?

It applies to all of the realistic scenarios I can think of for limit hold'em with the standard betting structures. I make no claims outside of that realm, though I would take a skeptical position towards claims that you have found one. I would encourage you to show some work if you think you've found a situation in which it applies.

There is no need. You’ve proven it wrong through concept.

Sorry, it doesn't actually work. The statement is about folding *ALL* rivers and not specific rivers. I was just caught up in the amusement of the example.

I'm just skimming through the argument about abstract versus concrete because I don't care about the pissing match but to repeat: In Seattle (really Renton) LHE games, there are players who are unbalanced enough toward [semi]bluffing turns and not rivers that I think it's 100% reasonable to crying call the turn and fold the river after improvement.

The K-high example above seems a little thin, but A6 on AQ97A might be a good example. (Or a 6 river, arguably a relatively better card.) If certain players bet again on the river, trips no kicker can never be good. But on the turn they might bet 86 or KJ or 98 or just feel lucky or whatever.

This would violate the assumption that your opponent was a "strong" player, but whatever.

It does make me wonder just how skewed your opponent would need to be for this to be correct.

So let's say you raise A6 from the button and BB calls 60%:

22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q2s+, J2s+, T3s+, 95s+, 85s+, 75s+, 64s+, 54s, A2o+, K2o+, Q5o+, J7o+, T7o+, 97o+, 87o

The flop comes AQ9. The action is check-bet-call. We're going to assume villain calls with any flush draw, any pair, any straight draw. That's a pretty generous bad play. We're also going to assume that all big hands check-call because LOL-slowplay-LDO. That, and it's just simpler to do the counting.

The range is now

AA = 1 hand (no flush draws)
KK = 6 hands (3 flush draws)
QQ = 3 hands (no flush draws)
JJ-TT = 12 hands (6 flush draws)
99 = 3 hands (no flush draws)
88-77 = 12 hands (6 flush draws)
66 = 3 hands (2 flush draws)
55-22 = 24 hands (12 flush draws)

AK = 8 hands (2 flush draws)
AQ = 6 hands (no flush draws)
AJ-AT = 16 hands (4 flush draws)
A9 = 9 hands (no flush draws)
A8-A7 = 16 hands (4 flush draws)
A6 = 9 hands (2 flush draws)
A5-A2 = 32 hands (8 flush draws)

KQ = 12 hands (3 flush draws)
KJ-KT = 32 hands (12 flush draws, 2 flushes)
K9 = 12 hands (3 flush draws)

QJ-QT = 24 hands (6 flush draws)
Q9 = 9 hands (no flush draws)
Q8-Q7 = 24 hands (6 flush draws)
Q6 = 9 hands (3 flush draws)
Q5-Q2 = 48 hands (12 flush draws)

JT = 16 hands (6 flush draws, 1 flush)
J9 = 12 hands (3 flush draws)
J8 = 16 hands (6 flush draws, 1 flush)
J7s-J2s = 6 hands (all flushes)
J 7x = 3 hands (no flush draws)
Jx 7 = 3 hands (no flush draws)

T9 = 12 hands (3 flush draws)
T8 = 16 hands (6 flush draws, 1 flush)
T7s-T3s = 5 hands (all flushes)
T 7x = 3 hands (no flush draws)
Tx 7 = 3 hands (no flush draws)

98-97 = 24 hands (6 flush draws)
96s = 2 hands (no flush draws)
95s = 3 hands (no flush draws)

87-85s = 3 hands (all flushes)
8 7x = 3 hands (no flush draws)
8x 7 = 3 hands (no flush draws)

76-75s = 2 hands (all flushes)

65-64s = 2 hands (all flushes)

54s = 1 hand (flush)

So if I didn't screw up the hand counts:

468 total hands
118 flush draws
24 flushes

If the 7 hits on the turn and villain bets 100% of his hands, he will be betting 142 flushes and 326 non-flushes. This is about 70% non-flushes. But A6 doesn't beat all the non-flushes. Other hands that beat A6:

Sets:
AA = 1 hand
QQ = 3 hands
99 = 3 hands
77 = 3 hands

Two pair:
AQ/A9/A7 = 18 hands
Q9/Q7/97 = 27 hands

Better aces:
AK/AJ/AT/A8/A7 = 40 hands

This is 95 more hands that are ahead, which is roughly another 20% of his range. This means villain is betting 237 better hands and 231 worse (or tied) hands. So you're basically 50-50 now.

So if we take the 50-50 to be roughly indicative of where you stand relative to your opponent's range, then at 4:1 pot odds, if your opponent is donking at least 25% of his range that's worse than your hand, then calling is profitable assuming that your opponent will only bet flushes on the river. You get a small +EV bonus being in position because you can value bet if he checks, which gives you a bit of a buffer to reduce the number of worse hands that are betting the turn and still be okay.

I remain skeptical that 40-60% of the population meet this description, but I'm open to the idea that this actually happens for select players.

I don't know if I made a mistake in the hand counts, but I know that the next sentence misses some card removal effects once the 7 can no longer be in villain's hands. This is at most a small error because of the overall size of the range involved.

1. Unlike in the NC thread, I'll +1 to the idea that there is a discrepancy between how useful this thread is and how useful this thread should be.

2. Despite the +1, I disagree that Aaron's posts are nonsense. They may even be factually correct. But they are unnecessarily antagonistic.

I'm also getting quite tired of the thread hijacking and general pedantry and contentiousness. I'd also describe it as selectively picking on certain other posters. Aaron W, please cut it out right now. I'm giving you a day off. Please don't force me to escalate things in future.

There is some useful information in this thread, it’s just that the signal to noise is ridiculous. Admittedly I made some inflammatory remarks, but my purpose was that hopefully it would make people reevaluate what they were posting.

To actually add value to the thread, I think the closest spot in LHE to k/c the turn with the intention of k/f the river on a blank is the 4flush turn card. But it’s when villain was the last aggressor on the flop (such as raise pf and bet flop), not when they take some kind of donk line.

I.e. they raise pf, you defend A6ss. Flop AQ9ddd. K/c. Turn 7d, we k/c. River 4s. When I’m playing 20/40 in Vegas against your standard HEFAP grinder reg, I think the river is a k/f.

I'm curious if any of the solvers k/f the river after calling the turn. This is pretty much the bottom of our range.